Somerset County, Maryland

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Revision as of 16:17, 20 May 2010

County Courthouse

11916 Somerset Avenue
Princess Anne, MD 21853

History

• Named for Mary, Lady Somerset, wife of Sir John Somerset and daughter of Thomas Arundell, 1st Baron Arundell of Wardour, sister of Anne (Arundell) Calvert, Baroness Baltimore, wife of Cecilius Calvert, 2nd Lord Baltimore. ^[1]

Parent County

• Created 22 August 1666 from the Colonial lands.

Boundary Changes

• 22 October 1842, Worcester County set off
• 17 August 1867, Wicomico County set off

Record Loss

In 1831 the courthouse burned, but the records were saved.^[2] For an excellent article about burned records refer to the Burned Counties Research page.

Places/Localities

Populated Places

City

• Crisfield

Town

• Princess Anne

Census Districts

Communities

Neighboring Counties

Dorchester | St. Mary's | Wicomico | Worcester | Accomack County, Virginia

Resources

Cemeteries

Cemetery Transcriptions

• Findagrave Transcriptions
• Histories and Transcriptions of Cemeteries in Somerset County.
• Interment
• Tombstone Transcription Project

Census

• 1800 Somerset County Census Images
• 1850 Somerset County Census Transcriptions

Federal Census reports available 1800-1930 including slave and veterans schedules. Exception-1830 Federal Census is missing.

Church

Maryland State Archives' Guide to Maryland Religious Institutions identifies all churches known to have existed in Somerset County, Maryland. It covers all denominations and includes record descriptions.

Court

Family Histories

• [Covington] Covington, Elbert E. Covington and Kin. DeSoto, Illinois: E.E. Covington, 1973?. Available at FHL; digital version at BYU Family History Archives.
• [Delaymos] Russell, George Ely. "Portuguese and Spanish Colonists in Seventeenth-Century Maryland," The American Genealogist, Vol. 76, No. 1 (January 2001):50-60.
• [Gibbons] Dryden, Ruth T. The Gibbons Family of Somerset County, Maryland. San Diego, California: R.T. Dryden, 1991. Available at FHL.
• [Gordy] See Melson.
• [Layfield] Hatcher, Patricia Law. "'Mother Nottle': A Correction to the Ancestry of George and Samuel Layfield of Maryland," The American Genealogist, Vol. 77, No. 1 (Jan. 2002):18-24.
• [Melson] Melson, Lewis B. The Melson Family in America: With Special Emphasis on the John-John-Daniel-Daniel-Benjamin-Samson Branch that Originated on the Eastern Shore of the Delaware-Maryland-Virginia Peninsula. 2 vols. Annapolis: L.B. Melson, 1996. Available at FHL.
• [Smith] Smith, Wesley. A Family History and Fifty-two Years of Preacher Life in Mississippi and Texas. Nashville, Tenn.: University Press, 1898. Available at FHL. [Discusses seventeenth-century Smith immigrants.]
• [Townsend] Bayles, John J. and James L. Taylor. Some Descendants of John Townsend of Snow Hill, Maryland, 1640-1698, Accomack Co., Va., and Somerset Co., Md. Oxnard, California: J.J. Bayles, 1989. Available at FHL.
• [Waggaman] Edwards, Thomas Clarke. The Waggamans and Their Allied Families. Paramus, New Jersey: T.C. Edwards, 1983. Available at FHL.
• [Wright] Wright, Charles W. The Wright Ancestry of Caroline, Dorchester, Somerset and Wicomico Counties Maryland. Baltimore: Baltimore City Printing and Binding Co., 1907. Available at FHL; digital versions at BYU Family History Archives and Google Books (full-view).

Gazetteers

Immigration

• List of imported servants and convicts from Europe who served labor terms in Colonial Somerset County, Maryland, courtesy: Immigrant Servants Database.

Land

Through a Joint eGovernment Service of the Maryland Judiciary and the Maryland State Archives, free images and indexes of the complete series of Somerset County Deed Books (1665-present) have been uploaded to their website: MDLandRec.Net: A Digital Image Retrieval System for Land Records in Maryland. (Requires free registration.)

Local Histories

Maps

Military

Newspapers

Probate

Taxation

Vital Records

Societies and Libraries

Web Sites

• FamilySearch.org Family History Library Catalog for Somerset County.
• Genealogy Trails
• The Somerset County MDGenWeb Project, a member of The MDGenWeb Project, an affiliate of The USGenWeb Project.
• The USGenWeb Archives Project for Somerset County.
• The USGenWeb Archives Project for Somerset County. (Backup site)

References

1. ↑ Somerset County, Maryland State Archives Website
2. ↑ Maryland Destroyed Courthouses   at My Maryland Genealogy accessed 21 October 2008.